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The Perseverance of the Long-Distance Swimmer

3:16 p.m. | Updated
HONG KONG— Diana Nyad, the American marathon swimmer, has ended her fourth attempt to swim nonstop from Cuba to Florida after some 60 hours in the water.

But stormy weather and jellyfish stings were her most significant obstacles, and at 7:42 a.m. local time on Tuesday, her support team said she had been pulled onto the boat “for the sake of the safety of her team and herself.”

“I’m not a quitter. I don’t give up on anything,” she told Sanjay Gupta of CNN, according to her Twitter stream.

Ms. Nyad, who turned 63 on Wednesday, was more than halfway through the 100-mile-plus journey and had spent three nights in the water. Storms had slowed her down the last two nights, and her lips were swollen and in pain from the stings and the saltwater.

Still, she and her team had remained optimistic. A pod of dozens of dolphins accompanied her for part of the route and was captured on video. “This is a sign,” one of her crew can be heard saying in the background. “They say dolphins bring good luck.”

At the age of 63, Diana Nyad swam longer and farther toward Florida from Cuba than she did when she was 28. ^MR

Ms. Nyad first tried the 100-mile-plus swim in 1978. She tried again last summer, twice, but an asthma flareup and jellyfish attacks forced her to stop.

Earlier this year, I wrote about her — and the growing interest in open-water swimming — in this Global Athlete column. She was also profiled in the New York Times Magazine, and the story has a number of striking photos.

Two days ago from halfway around the world in Beijing, I began following Ms. Nyad on Twitter as she set off on her journey.

Since then, I’ve returned to Hong Kong, put in a couple of days at the office, had a few great meals and two nights of solid sleep. All the while, Ms. Nyad kept on swimming.

The greatest dangers facing Ms. Nyad were jellyfish and sharks. She was wearing a special protective suit and pantyhose on her face to protect her from the jellyfish. And shark divers patrolled the waters around her.

One of those divers was stung by a jellyfish less than three hours into the swim. Ms. Nyad was also stung, by a flower hat jellyfish, about 5 hours into her swim. A box jellyfish also got her on the hand, and she suffered stings to her lips and forehead. At one point she was swimming backstroke to fend off the jellyfish with her cap-covered head.

Jellyfish helped to foil both of Ms. Nyad’s swims last year as she encountered some dangerous types, notably the box jellyfish.

“She called jellyfish expert Angel Yanagihara at the University of Hawaii, who diagnosed that the boat’s white lights probably attracted them,” said Candace Hogan, in a blog post from aboard the support vessel Quest in the Florida Straits. “This time, Diana’s boats are using only red lights, which are not appealing to them.”

Their venom is considered to be among the most deadly in the world, containing toxins that attack the heart, nervous system, and skin cells. It is so overpoweringly painful, human victims have been known to go into shock and drown or die of heart failure before even reaching shore. Survivors can experience considerable pain for weeks and often have significant scarring where the tentacles made contact.

Ms. Nyad’s persistence has inspired people around the world to stay fit — and to continue to achieve new goals — at all stages in life. In my opinion, she’s a true Global Athlete.